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It’s officially winter, and while many of us are dreaming of cozy fires and hot cocoa, our six-legged (and occasionally eight-legged or four-legged) friends have the exact same idea. In the pest world, there’s a common misconception that once it gets cold, all the bugs just… disappear. I wish it were that simple! While some go into diapause (essentially insect hibernation), others decide that your heated facility or home is the perfect place to ride out the chill. Here’s the

One of the reasons I have the best job is that I get to troubleshoot. I get to try to put puzzles together, often without all the pieces. I tend to have a “standard” set of questions I start with to pry out additional information, and then I let my brain start working through the problem. I know that when a question gets to me, it’s likely the client has already tried all the “basic” IPM steps so it’s always exciting to start thinking about how to get creative with pest contr

We're back this month with our series of ten questions with a pro. Every other month, I’m interviewing a “pro” to find out what they do, how they do it, and how it helps pest control efforts. Today, we are talking with the fabulous Dr. Jody Green! 1. Give us the quick version of what you do?  I am an extension educator and urban entomologist with Nebraska Extension. I provide education and resources to help people make better decisions associated with arthropod pests in their

I had an amazingly good picture sent to me recently for identification and I realized I haven’t talked about these little insects* on the blog yet.   There are millions of springtails in the soil. They are tiny so most people will never notice them outside. There are over eight thousand species worldwide wide but most scientists will tell you that is a huge underestimation. It’s just that no one has identified the rest yet. They get the name “springtail” because many species

I have a lot of google alerts for words relating to pest control. I typically skim through, look for any scientific articles and quickly delete. Then this one caught my eye.   Ugh, here we go again, I think to myself. And yes, here we go again.   Now, I get it. Pesticides are scary, especially when you call them “poisons”. Yes, they are intended to knock down the pest. Yes, some are poisonous (ingested). Yes, we want to make sure only the target animal is impacted by the pest

Sometimes pest problems are relatively easy to manage. One or two visits, some targeted treatments, sanitation, and exclusion recommendations, and presto! Problem solved! Then there are the times it isn’t so easy. Particularly when it seems the customer is working against you.   The other day, I was at a location, let’s say it was a bookstore. (It wasn’t, I’m trying to protect the innocent here!) Now, as I was browsing through the bookstore, out of the corner of my eye, I saw

In my last job, I had to take “media training” and one of the first things I learned was never use the word “pesticide”. They recommended “treatment” or “product” or something else along those lines. Why? Why shouldn’t we say it? Mostly, it’s because people have a bad image of pesticides, and there is a negative reaction.   The problem with that…pesticide is not a dirty word. It’s part of a well laid out integrated pest management plan. Anyone who’s had considerable pest issu

It’s October and that means it’s my favorite season of the year: spider season! Living in Georgia (USA), we are still under siege from the invasive Joro spider . It is actually a very pretty spider that builds big orb-shaped webs. While these are beneficial (I am pretty sure we had next to no mosquito issues this summer because of all these webspinners), they are very abundant. People don’t like them near their structures, and there is the “ick” factor of walking through one

Someone posted a link to this article , and I kind of laughed it off and went on with my morning. My brain kept going back to it, though,...

I was recently asked to write an article on “natural” pest control. I almost didn’t. It’s like talking about “safe” pesticides or...

I heard a new term yesterday, and I figured it was an internet hoax. You know what happens next: I had to investigate and look it up....

It is summer here in Georgia, and the cicadas are singing away. It’s not the deafening dissonance of the cicadas in Kansas; it’s more the...